Traveling with Cats

Lorena's version of the events. We still have not been able to get Swirls and Pokey to write their perspective. At first, they were just too traumatized. By now, I do believe they have repressed their memories.

Saturday, August 5, 2006

We gave a half tablet of Benadryl each to Swirls and Pocatalico, or Pokey, at about 7:30 AM. The Benadryl created the opposite of the desired affect. Swirls’ pupils were enlarged and the cats were chasing each other and playing quite friskily. We had everything loaded and ready to go at about two hours after the supposed sedative was administered. Swirls and Pokey were in their extra large canvas carrier and placed between the bucket seats of the moving truck. Pokey meowed nearly continuously for about an hour or two and eventually settled down somewhat, but continued to vocalize his annoyance. Both cats were still wide awake every time I peaked in the carrier. I draped a blanket over the carrier in attempt to persuade them to sleep. Swirls was more easily persuaded and began sleeping around noon. Pokey, on the other hand, finally slept around 2:30 PM.

We found a campground at about 9:00 PM Central Time. I tried to let the kitties out on their leashes, but all the noise seemed to frighten them. Chris and I felt it best to keep Swirls and Pokey inside their carrier and under the rainfly of our tent for the night. Pokey was not happy that he had to remain contained. Swirls was as easy-going about it all as ever. About 4:00 AM it began to rain. Before long it was storming and I could hear Pokey crying and pushing at the edges of the carrier. He had been doing that when he was upset during the day, so I thought nothing of it. I awoke in the continuing rain again at 6:00 AM and decided to move the cats to the cab of the truck and let them out of the carrier. I prepared the truck, opened the rainfly and picked up a very light kitty carrier. They had somehow managed to work the zipper open and escape!

“Chris! The cats are out!” I said into the tent.

As Chris roused himself for the search, I called for Swirls through the rain, expecting his response first and heard a plaintive meow from Pokey coming from under the car carrier trailer. I sweet talked to him and he did not pull away as I reached under and pulled out a rather wet Pocatalico. I took him to the truck and dried him as best I could with the cleaning rags we carried there.

The search for Swirls continued. Pokey had a few sticky burs in his fur and Chris thought he may have heard soft meowing coming from the woods just behind our campsite, so that is were we looked. Chris and I walked into the woods apart from each other calling for Swirls. I soon heard a small meow, so I called again. Swirls and I responded to each other until I was pretty certain he was near. He had found a small area where limbs and leaves had gathered above a gulley and was staying near the back of his little “cave” to stay out of the rain. He seemed happy to see me, but still did not want to come out in the rain to come to me and I did not want to lie down in the sticky mud to reach in and grab him. We merely looked at each other for probably about a minute, though it seemed much longer. I finally decided to pull some of the leaves off the top of the limbs above Swirls to reach him. I did so and pulled out a wet and muddy Swirls. We went back to the truck to much rejoicing.

We decided to skip the antihistamine today and even decided to try not using the cat carrier since it was very wet. It wasn’t too much longer and we were on our way, surprisingly not too far off of our targeted departure time. Within an hour, both cats have settled in and have found a place to sleep off the intensity of their adventure. Pokey seems to like being curled up on my lap or cradled in my arms.

We are headed for North Dakota to another night of camping with the cats. Tonight, they are going to sleep in the truck.

The Journey to Idaho, Day 4

I think last night was about the best we've slept along the way. Maybe we're just getting used to the time difference (doubt it) or maybe it's just the western air (probably). It was a beautiful morning and we got an early start once again. Next stop, Moscow. After leaving Three Forks and as we approached Missoula, the road took a decidedly downhill attitude. I kept watching the mile markers after we left one stop for gas and we went downhill for 20 miles. Albeit it was a very gradual down hill but I was just imagining being one of the trucks going the opposite direction. It certainly helped our gas mileage! Probably the next coolest place we went through was Lookout Pass as we crossed the Idaho/Montana border. I learned a little bit from the Continental Divide and pulled it down into 2nd to see if it would make much difference. The sheer drop-off into the canyon was insane. Even more insane was the fact that there were logging companies actively logging those slopes. And we think some of the 'cowboys' in the HDD and excavation world did some insane things. We saw some of the logging trucks coming down the switch-back roads on the sides of these mountains and I can't image how they even got up there. If it rained even a little bit, those roads had to become grease slicks. Probably not much fun to roll down a hill with a load of logs to aid in your descent. After we descended into the valley floor, we came into a few old mining towns that still have some active mines into the mountainsides. I guess there was a lot of silver and copper mined from the Wallace, ID area and some still is. The next big city was Coeur D'Alene, ID. There is a big lake aptly named Coeur D'Alene that the city was founded on. Pretty big boating community and maybe even a bedroom community for Spokane, WA. One thing they do make there that we love is beer. Primarily the aptly named Coeur D'Alene Brewing Company. They have a pub here in Moscow where you can get 22 oz mugs of any of their brews for less than $2.50. Hell, their 6-packs are only $6. They also have a wing night were you order by the pound and serve them in buckets. It's definitely one of our favourite places in town. I wish we could bring their Vanilla Bourbon Stout back for everyone to try. Once in CDA we get off of the interstate and it the only north-south highway in Idaho, route 95. It's referred to as the 'Goat Trail' because it's only 2-lane and is pretty winding. While we were on it, they were doing a lot of construction to make it 4-lane near CDA. As we got closer to Moscow the construction stopped and the only thing we saw was wheat fields being harvested. I wish we had some pictures of these combines driving on the slopes because it is impressive. The John Deere 9600 series hillside combines are waaaay bigger than most of what is found in Ohio. It's even more impressive to see 4 or 5 working on the same field at the same time. They create quite a dust storm at the same time. So we arrived in Moscow at about 3pm local time. Our landlords weren't there right when we got there but soon arrived. We started to unload the truck and made sure our bed was one of the first things in the door so we had some place to collapse after carrying in everything. After a little while we decided we'd carried in enough and needed some food. Next stop, CDA Brewing Company for some dinner and Vanilla Bourbon Stout. Mmmmmm. We turned in a little early by local standards but that's just because we haven't adjusted to the 3-hour time difference. It gets dark a little earlier than it does in Ohio because we're on the extreme eastern edge of the Pacific Time Zone. That's all for now. I'm sure we'll have more to write about after classes start and we get settled in.

The Journey to Idaho, Day 3

We pulled out of Jamestown at like 7:30 this morning feeling pretty good. We knew that again we would have a long day ahead of us. Our original goal was to make it to Missoula, MT on the third day but since we came up a little bit short of Bismarck yesterday, we thought we’d come up a bit short of Missoula today. Bozeman, MT was starting to sound like a pretty good stopping point.

Let’s just say that North Dakota is pretty flat a little bit barren. We planned on stopping in the Theodore Roosevelt National Park for lunch and little did we know that it would take us to Painted Canyon. I think we only got a few shots of the canyon on our digital camera before the memory card ran out. We’ll just have to wait for the rolls of film to get developed. Here’s a shot of the canyon:

Once we crossed into Montana, it started to get a bit hillier and the truck let us know it. More than once I was a little bit nervous about it overheating but it never did. I guess those civil engineers knew what they were doing after all….

The biggest challenge, and by far the most nervous I’ve ever been in a vehicle, was going across the Continental Divide approaching Butte, MT. It was something like a 6% grade for about 4 miles uphill. The truck didn’t overheat but we were certainly going very slowly, around 30mph. Once we got over the top, the descent was the most nerve racking. Not only was it a 6% grade down the other side, they threw quite a few turns into it. I didn’t feel comfortable at much over 50mph and when I hit the brakes to slow a bit, the whole truck would start shaking. I’m not sure what was up with that but at least there wasn’t smoke rolling out of any fender wells. (A wee jab at Joe Smith!) We made it through Butte just fine and I have to say that anybody who lives on the ranches out this way has a tough row to hoe. The sheer slopes and seeming barrenness of it make it a little bit inhospitable. Then again, if you want isolation this is where you go.

As we neared Bozeman, there tended to be more mountains and a lot of pine trees. Some of the very highest peaks looked like they still had a little bit of snow above the tree line. We thought we were going to get rained on in Bozeman but it all stayed to our South. It looked ominous though, the dark clouds in the mountains. We hoped we wouldn’t have a repeat of Saturday night/ Sunday morning in Wisconsin. We decided to camp at Three Forks State Park, which is the headwaters of the Little Missouri River. Camping here is primitive (just the way we like it) and cheap. I think it was $12 for the night but we had a nice spot that was easy to negotiate with the truck and trailer. They did have running water and a bathroom and it wasn’t crowded at all (just the way we like it). Lorena thought she heard coyotes barking during the night. It was fairly in the boondocks. Yet another quiet and cool, clear night. Tomorrow we arrive in Moscow, ID!!

The Journey to Idaho, Day 2

Today started out with a little bit of adventure... at least for the cats. It started to storm during the night and we heard the cats meowing because they didn't like the storm. Since it had been so warm when we went to sleep the previous night, we had the rainfly half open for ventilation. As soon as we heard the rain, we both woke up and closed the rainfly on each side of the tent. It was about 4AM and the cats were still in their carrier. Lorena woke up at 6AM and went to put the cats and their carrier in the cab of the truck so they'd be a little bit happier. When she picked up the carrier, it was too light and she exclaimed 'Oh shit Chris, the cats are out.' It was still raining pretty good and I hurried up and got dressed to begin the search. By the time I got out of the tent, Lorena had found Pokey hiding under the car hauler, a bit damp but now safe in the cab of the truck. Swirls was nowhere to be seen. I grabbed an umbrella (Lorena was already soaked) and we began searching. We looked along the edge of the woods behind our site and up under surrounding campers and vehicles, hoping to see the silhouette of a cat. Nothing. Lorena decided she would go take a shower and I continued to search. As I walked along the edge of the woods, I heard what sounded like faint meowing coming from the woods but I could barely hear anything over the sound of rain hitting my umbrella. When Lorena got back, we descended into the woods to see if we could find Swirls. She started down into a little gulley and called for him. She too heard some meowing and eventually found him tucked into a little sheltered spot at the start of the gulley, trying to keep himself dry. He had also managed to get rather muddy in the process and it took a little bit of effort to get him out of his hiding spot. He too was damp, muddy, and very glad to now be in the warm, dry cab of the truck. We were also very glad to have both of them safe in the truck. We were afraid we were going to have to wait for Swirls to finish his adventure before we could leave, thus getting a much later start than we had planned. After I got my shower, we broke down the tent in the rain and headed up the road. A brief stop at Burger King for breakfast (not what we had planned but it worked) and up I90 we went. Next stop, somewhere in North Dakota near Bismarck. The Wisconsin Dells are pretty cool in the daylight but the area is rather built up with touristy type things. We made it into Minnesota before lunch and let's just say that Minnesota is one pretty state. Even the twin cities look nice and we breezed through them too. No traffic snarls or anything. Northwestern Minnesota has some huge wheat fields and they were harvesting at the time we were driving through. Certainly some bigger machinery than I'm used to. We pushed on into North Dakota but realized we weren't going to make Bismarck. We settled on Jameston, ND as our stopping point. The cats had been sleeping pretty much all day and since their carrier had gotten wet during the morning's events, they freely roamed to cab when they were awake... which wasn't very much. We didn't even have to give them their drugs! Jamestown, ND is small town. We camped on a lake just north of town called Smokey's Landing and Campground. It was $10 for the night, wasn't crowded at all and much easier to negotiate with the truck and trailer. We still cooked our dinner after dark but the sunset was pretty awesome over the lake. Tonight, the cats get to sleep in the cab of the truck with their food, water, and litter box. Searching for felines is not on the agenda for tomorrow. It was a clear night and we slept well. Here's a shot of the lake and Lorena in the tent under the moonlight:

The Journey to Idaho, Day 1

What a crazy day. We got up at 6AM to finish putting stuff in the truck and get the cats situated. Lorena gave Swirls and Pokey their Benadryl so they would be calm for the trip, only to have the opposite effect. They chased each other around and were pretty wound up when it came time to leave. Lorena put them in their carrier and then in the cab of the truck, something Pokey let us know he didn't like too well. After some tearful goodbyes, we headed up the road. Pokey wasn't quite sure what to think of all of the fast passing scenery out the window and continued with his deep throated meowing for quite a while. We got so involved in what was on NPR that morning that we missed our first turn onto the turnpike. So, we headed on up to Cleveland and got there via I480. Fortunately it was early on a Saturday and there was no rush hour traffic to contend with. I've driven the turnpike before but it seemed especially long today. Particularily in Indiana. As we approached Chicago, we had a couple of options. We could continue on I80 and stay away from downtown or take I90/94 through downtown and avoid the construction that was posted for I80. We opted for the latter.... only to find that it was all torn up downtown. Between the umpteen toll booths and construction, it took us an hour and a half to get through Chicago. It was cool to see and all but we were glad it was behind us. Next stop Wisconsin Dells, WI. We planned on camping at the state park in the Dells but when we got there at about 8:45pm, the campground was full. Total bummer. They suggested we go to the Jellystone campground just up the road. Off we rolled to Jellystone. Let's just say that this was not our idea of camping. Especially paying $75 for one night of TENT CAMPING. It was particularily wonderful to try manipulating a moving truck with the car trailer in tow through the campground and then back it into the campsite.... in the dark. I almost hung the back wheels of the trailer off of the end of the gravel landing of our campsite to get it back far enough to keep the truck off of the road. We were never so glad to set up a tent and go to sleep. It was a long day. We put the cats in their carrier and put the carrier under the rainfly of the tent in case it rained. The cats were pretty freaked out because of how busy the campground was and the noise. We figured they'd be safe through the night and we went to sleep....